


Cúpla Comhionann

by Tribunus



Series: For All The Skein 'Twixt [3]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Anders Vores A Man (And Several More), Anders and Alice MST2K a Letter, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Child Abuse, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dehumanization, Dermatillomania/Skin Excoriation, Dissociation, Gen, Intersex Characters (CAH), It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Large Quantity of Eyes, Remus's No Good Very Bad Childhood, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2019-08-25 05:58:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 6,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16655524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tribunus/pseuds/Tribunus
Summary: Anders comes into possession of a child that looks suspiciously like himself. Everything goes downhill from there.6/8/2019 - Gutted and overhauled.Ft. Attempt to cohesively convey my own variation, which Anders and Remus both inherited.Does get very grisly, so mind the tags and please be cautious.





	1. Anders

Rain pattered against the driver’s cover as the carriage rattled to a halt. Somewhere ahead of us, the horse huffed past its bit.

I opened my eyes through Zeheikel’s.

“Are you sure this one’s right?”  he asked, craning his neck to look past where I sat.

I sighed, taking in his view of the bland, unremarkable cottage perched across the damp sídhe.

“Unfortunately.”  I shifted my cane and stood, stooping low against the cover.

“Do you want me to come with you?”

“No. Remain here.”

He rolled his eyes, forcing me to grip the frame of the driver’s platform as he wrung me through a wave of vertigo.

“Please.”

“What?”

“Refrain.”

“Oh.”

“Thank you.”

He tossed me the umbrella from the trunk, and I unfurled it before stepping down. Cold, muddy water oozed into my shoes, sloshing around my ankles and tugging at my cane.

_Don’t think about it._

I took a step. An eye twitched.

_Revolting._

Another step.

It was an agonizing trudge, unhelpfully paired with a limp whose existence I’d been reminded of several hours prior.

The rain was diverted by the overhang of the roof at which I presently arrived. It was enough of a place of respite that I could close the umbrella and prop it by the door before re-straightening my gloves.

I watched as I turned to ‘look’ back at him, and caught his arm in the peripheral; I returned the wave.

He was still so inclined towards little gestures like that.

I turned back to the task at hand.

With an inhale, a shift of my posture, and an exhale, I knocked.

The quarry within stirred, and I found his eyes. They flickered from a deep cooking pot to the door, then back again. I spotted honey on a shelf, cured meats, and a slurry of red in a jar before he stood and turned away. His cooking mitts were tugged off and tossed out of sight.

He unfastened the locks on the door, squinting against the cloud-muted midday light.

Then stepped back as I added myself to the intrusion, his boots nearly tripping him on one of many thick rugs.

I stepped in after him, nudging the door shut with a heel.  “Hello.”

His vision left me, found a loose brick at the base of the oven, and aimed it towards my head. My shoulders shifted me away from its path, then returned to the original posture.

“I suppose this means you know why I’ve come to call?”

“One of the few things you don’t leave to guesswork.”  His voice hardened, and I inferred that his face had done the same.  “You took your sweet time coming around. Was beginning to think maybe you'd forgotten.”

“No, no. I choose to pace myself. You know this. No sense in rushing. There's something to be said on retribution and its serving temperature; I'm certain you're aware of the phrase.”

“Retribution for retribution doesn’t have the same moral right you seem to think it does.”

“Ridiculous of you to assume that I’ve ever bothered with such a piddling fixation as morality. I am inclined towards self-servitude. Were this just basic retribution, I would not have so luxuriated in it.”

He scoffed.

I glanced away, and found Zeke’s eyes trained on a book.

“Y’know, what you got out of it still seems skewed in your favor.”

The comment brought me back. He had moved a pace closer.

“True. And I do _quite_ take advantage of that reality.”

“I’ve heard you don’t.”

 _Perhaps._  “I take advantage so far as it brings me enjoyment. Full indulgence, I think, would be much more a prison.”

“You’re still an infuriatingly vague bastard, aren’t you?”

“I am, aren't I? Adelheidis claims the same.”

“She's-? … I suppose that makes sense.”

“Hm?”

“Nothing. Let’s just be done with this.”

I plucked a toothpick from my coat and entertained it against one of my incisors.

“On your own time, I’ve nowhere else to be.”

He frowned, flexing his hands together so the knuckles cracked, before lowering into a pugilistic stance.

I flicked the pick away, and smiled sweetly.

“Do say hello to the rest.”

 

* * *

 

 

My left leg whinged as I reconstructed my glamour. His eyes had become inert - consumption did that to a person - which left me without visual reference. I returned to the more traditional alternatives, and tapped my cane as I moved, attempting to suss out a clear path back to the door. Fight-scattered clutter and fallen knives proved to be the primary walking hazards; I collected the latter back into myself as I came across them. 

Until a low sound gave me reason to pause.

_ A door hinge, was it? _

I probed outwards, frowning, but found no eyes inside. 

Quiet footsteps began to approach; small ones. The owner had to be more diminutive than Zeke.

Another door opened, this one closer, and I turned so my face angled towards the sound. There was a sharp inhale, and the footsteps fled. 

Pushing my way clear with the cane, I walked after it. Its motions were too coordinated, too quick to be from someone unable to process its surroundings - a curiosity. 

I didn’t appreciate the hypothetical issues it presented.

Another door slammed shut in front of me as I drew close. I dismissed it to the Skein.

A quick touch identified the room beyond as a small coat closet. Something tried to brush past my leg, and it cried as I struck the cane downward. I reached for it and found hair, then some manner of sweater, the material unidentifiable beneath my gloves. I pulled the inconvenience up like an unwanted kitten, and it whined pitifully. 

From pain of the strike, and from some innocent fear of the unknown. 

I tucked it away just as I had the door.


	2. Alice

I got home to the old man in a bathrobe, tits out and the skin around his ankles picked with fresh holes, chair facing uselessly out of the open windows.

“Could push you through right now, y’know.”

“I’m aware. You’d fail.”

“Want to bet?”

“Not particularly.”

I joined him, and tapped an extra glass from the tray against the wine bottle. He poured me some, the usual pressure on my sinuses a sign that he was leeching off me.

“You know I hate that.”

“I do. You’re aware that I don’t really care.”

“Yep.”  I downed a mouthful.

His nose curled.  “You stink of sweat.”

“I was busy.”

“Hm.”

“Looks like you were too. Feet get dirty?”

He shifted, more irritated than uncomfortable.  “Moors are prone to flooding.”

“Yes, they are.”  I slumped back across his desk, propping my feet up on the chair arm.

“Don’t spill it.”

“I’m not a child.”

“Your demeanor would fool even the best of us.”

“Well, sorry that we can’t all be old and crotchety.”

“I am a well-aged, impeccable, and eloquent delight.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

He sighed and shot me a familiar expression. I shot him a rude gesture. He calmly offered the same, and I didn’t bother to bite back the snort.

_ Ass. _

“I have something that I collected today,”  he noted, hand folding again.

“From the moor?”

He nodded, gesturing with his glass. A split wavered across his glamour, eyes and inky nothingness rippling as it formed around something, then expelled it.

I looked on with horror as his expression turned to disdain, like this was his first actual look at what he’d found.

It took me too long to process, too many tries to make words connect, but I finally choked out something comprehensible.

_ “Anders.” _

“Hm?”

“That is  _ a child.” _

“Your point?”

I nearly smashed my drink over his thick head, but held back.

The kid was shivering, curled like a cornered rabbit, face pale and glistening with a sheen of cold sweat.

I stood, grabbed the arm of Anders’ sleeve, and pulled him away from his chair despite his attempt to shake free.

_“Where_ did you get a _child?”_  I hissed.  “One that _looks like you?_ … Did you-?”

“Absolutely  _ not. _ I’ve never cultivated interest in such a pastime.”

“Bullshit, I’ve seen you at festivals with-”

“Wholly irrelevant.”

_ “How?” _

He waved a hand, like that explained away everything.  “Irrelevant.”

“Fine. You running off to be your slutty self didn’t result in creating a child, sure. That doesn’t explain why you  _ have one.” _

“I informed you. It isn’t mine, I simply collected it.”

I rubbed my face.  “Right, from the moors, yeah. From who? One of your revenge fetishes?”

“‘Revenge fetish’ is so  _ crass  _ a phrase.”

“It’s a revenge fetish. You’ve been dragging it out as long as I’ve known you, just because they put your ass in a rock for being shitty.”

He puffed up, indignant.  “It was an  _ obelisk. _ And not for, as you so blithely put it, ‘being shitty’.”

“So one of them made a backup you.”

“Perhaps. It was simply in his home. I’m uncertain of where it was actually produced.”  He paused to drink, and I eyed the now-motionless form on the floor. “Nor am I aware of the process used to null Savant from its eyes.”

_ Null Savant? _  “... What?”

He waved a hand across his fake eyes.  “I am unable to, as you say, ‘leech’ from it. The phenomenon is something I’d like to comprehend before its termination.”

I started, then paused. He wasn’t going to care about anyone just on the basis of them existing, and I knew better than to try and make him.

_ The fact that Zeke or I specifically can talk shit with him doesn’t make him decent. _

I watched as he approached the child again, nudged them, then tucked them back into his wretched folds of eyes and fur. He kept on then, quieter, almost conspiratorial.  

“Though, I do admit, the thought of a potential risk to my existence is a morbid sort of  _ thrill.” _

“So you miss when I was hunting your neck?”

He sank back into his chair, smiling with a paternal condescension.  “Dear, sweet child. That implies you were ever  _ threatening.” _

“You’ve got the scars.”

“From the sword, perhaps. But not a scratch is from you.”


	3. Yemonos

I didn’t move. Not when I was tossed to the cold floor. Not when I was put back into the dark room. And not when I was dropped again, to a patch of sharp grass and old stones.

A pair of oily black shoes stood out in the corner of my eye, tapping impatiently.

“Is this your only defensive capability? Stand. You’re making a fool of yourself.”

I stood.

“No speaking.”

I nodded, eyes fixed down, and trailed behind when he started to walk. Each pace was three clicks - cane, foot, foot, and repeat - like how a lopsided goat might sound. 

The path itself was broken, the stones cracked where plants had forced their way through. Shiny rocks littered the way, and I scooped up a few that had been broken off. They weighed nice in my pockets.

I dared to look up a bit more, and watched the man. 

His legs were long, like mine.

His hair was black, and thick, like mine. 

His eyes weren’t like mine.

I swallowed and looked down to his neck. He had a short loop of a scarf, purple and yellow. A long rope of tan scales hung around his shoulders, curled up into the cloth like the man’s neck was just a pillar for its nest.

I watched the snake. Its head, just barely visible, watched the path ahead.

“Are you incapable of pacing yourself faster?”

“I’m sorry.”

“No speaking.”

_ I’m sorry. _

 

* * *

 

The trees were better to look at, with purple and red leaves and short, twisted trunks. They rose with the slope of the ground as we made our way up two different white-stone stairs, broken like the path was. At the top, he began to speak: 

“As you may have already extrapolated from the nature of-”

But I was too busy staring up, open-mouthed, at the building in front of us.

It was huge, broken and old, like a half-finished cube puzzle that stretched over the trees. 

“- as, unlike Gehir Schoene -”

The inside was just as massive, open, overgrown with ferns and fungi and small trees whose roots cut across the floors and up the walls. 

“- masses of arms, or mere glyphic  _ scrawl  _ -”

Rooms branched off of the circular one we were in, but instead of walking towards one, he suddenly stopped; I didn’t realize until I bumped into him.

“Have you been granting me your attention?”

I froze, cold, and tried to nod.

“Well?”

He wouldn’t turn around, so I had to step around to his front, nodding harder. The snake’s tongue flicked; he looked unimpressed. 

“I suggest you consider methods to make yourself less unappealing. As it stands, you are unlikely to last the month. Extrapolating your nature will not be difficult, and I’ve no need for anything with unusable eyes in the post-proceedings.”

_ ‘End the one with too many eyes.’ _

But he only had two. The always-phrase didn’t fit.

_ ‘Finish what the rest started.’ _

“I’ve an individual that will fall under my purview within several days. While my original intent for them is more satisfactory, they will suit this purpose just as well. If you require such, I’m certain some of these growths are edible and will carry you through until then.”

“Wait-”

“No speaking.”

His head curled back as the skin on his neck split with black hair, and bone, and eyes that ran like eggs, like he was turning himself inside out. In a shuddering collapse he was gone. 

I’d fallen to the floor, shrieking hoarse, and felt myself begin to cry.

_ One million, seven hundred and fifty-two thousand hours- _

 

* * *

 

I sat, curled up at the base of one of the room’s trees, arms hugged across my chest as I tried to stop the quivering. 

At some point, I think, I must have fallen asleep.

And when I got up, I started to walk. Back down the stairs, back down the path, slow and quiet. It felt too dream-like, too close to wading through water, and I just wanted to go home and curl up in bed. 

_ Wonder if he’s noticed I’m not home. _

_ Hope he isn’t worried. _

 

* * *

 

I stood at the edge, staring out at the tangled sprawl below, then back. 

Earlier, I hadn’t looked up, but maybe I should have. The sky was full of chunks of ground, broken apart and floating in a mess of lightless thorns and knots, writhing and groaning like it was breathing. 

The sun was somewhere, lost in all of it, but close enough that its light still reached. 

I sat, and let my legs dangle off the edge, hoping that the dirt would crumble.


	4. Alice

“Alice.”

“Hey.”

“Join me, we’re walking.”

“Where’d you stash the kid?”

He sighed dramatically.  “I’ve placed it on one of the old experiments.”

“Experiments?”

“It is still endlessly disappointing that you were never so much as given a primary of Seelabalga.”

“Sorry that my education was lacking. You weren’t there.”

“And a terrible shame that is.”

_ Yeah. She could’ve kept fucking you up instead. _  “So where’d you put them?”

“Seelabalga?”

“No, dipshit, the kid.”

“I informed you, it’s off on one of the abandoned worlds. Shattered into motes now, quite contained.”

“You left them in the  _ Skein?” _

He shrugged innocently, tugging on his gloves and coat.  “Better than here, where I’d have to look at it.”

“I’ve told you, Sor could take them.”

“No. Come along now.”

I slotted in my bookmark then tossed the book aside, hopping off the couch to join him by the door.  “You can ask politely, fucker.”

“Please.”

“Don’t have to look like I made you eat raw eggs while you do it.”

“I only need to borrow your eyes.”

“The snake won’t cut it, huh?”

He extended his arm.  “I require a larger spectrum than vague shapes and heat signatures, yes.”

I hooked mine in with his, and not gently.  “Fine.”

 

* * *

 

The detransition from his liminal state was always jarring, and disgustingly close to being regurgitated. How Zeke was used to it, how  _ neither  _ of them ever had to wait for the room to stop spinning, I’d never get.

“Hurry now, I’ve no interest in standing here while you laze about.”

I shot him a finger. He mirrored it, like always, and part of me realized he might not actually know what the sign meant. 

That made it even better.

I got up, and we started towards the cottage. 

“You get here like that last time?”

“No. Zeke and I brought a carriage.”

_ Honestly. _  “A carriage.”

“It was more scenic,”  he offered simply.

“You’re both off it.”

“Aren’t we? He’s less undeniably insufferable about it.”

“Yeah, he is.”

The ground was still spongy, but it must have been dry enough to not get through his shoes, since he wasn’t complaining. He stooped low through the left-open door, and I followed, shooing off a few rodents that had already taken to scavenging the spice jars. 

“Do you remember him?”

“Hm?”

“Malwine. I’m certain I recall your existence during at least one or two of the old haunts. You would have still been quite larval.”

I frowned, squinted, trying to think back - what he was asking would’ve been centuries ago.  “I think so. Burly?” I pointed to the large harp tucked in the corner, half buried in other curios.  “Played that every so often, didn’t he?”

Anders nodded, nudging the cauldron in the firepit with the tip of his cane.  “Dreadful pain on the ears.”

“I liked it.”

“Nonsense, you cried.”

“Right, yeah, from the harp. Not from you threatening to eat my hands if I didn’t stop getting them in your hair.”

“So, you recall that part.”

I shrugged.  “Coming back to me. What’re we looking for?”

He ignored the question in favor of unscrewing the lid of a jar filled with something red and thick, dipping a finger in, and licking the contents off, before offering it to me. 

“... No thanks.”

“Do try.”

“You got it off a dead guy’s shelf, Anders.”

“And I happen to be the one that consumed him, so the action is ethically sound.”

“That’s not how any of those words work.”

“Nonsense.”

He offered the jar again, and I begrudgingly took a small bit on the end of my pinky. It tasted harsh, metallic, like it’d been pumped full of iron and then loaded down with salt and honey. 

Anders kept eating it in the same fashion he did mustard, or frosting. I just stared in increasing disgust.

_ “How?” _

“I used to require similar.”

“But you hate salt- It’s the honey. You are a  _ grown person, _ Anders, I  _ swear, _ but you  _ just-” _

“I enjoy simple delights! Even if they are wrapped in foul concoctions.”

“Did you just. Drag me out here so you could eat the nasty honey, Anders?”

“Perhaps.”

I inhaled to yell at him, but he interrupted with a hand.

“However, do look around.”

“For  _ what?” _

“I’ll be aware of it when you see it.”

 

* * *

 

I could still hear him off in the den, humming to himself. 

_ Going to throw all your shoes in that stew pot, old man. _

But it was better than him fumbling around, getting in the way while we worked through the same set of eyes. 

I’d found two bedrooms. One was clearly for a child. Simple, comfortable; full of interestingly shaped rocks, weaselled away scraps, and dead flowers that, at the time of collection, had probably been very nice looking. Signatures on sketchy pencil drawings were large, looped, and all read ‘Yemonos’.

I tucked the name away for later.

The other must have been Malwine’s. Unlike the rest of the home, it was almost entirely devoid of any knicknacks or assorted collectables: just a bed, a nightstand, a desk with some neatly stacked vials, and a long wooden box tucked beneath. 

I heard Anders’ cane tap down the hall, and I paused until he propped himself in the doorway, still sampling his awful find. 

“Yes?”

“Desk first, then the chest.”

“Could’ve waited back there for that, I was already getting there.”

“I was certain you missed my visage.”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder.”

“I was correct.”

_ Hardly. _  I pried open one of the drawers, and extracted the stacks of papers. 

“Go back for a moment.”

“Hm?”

“Two prior pages.”

I went back two in the stack, and skimmed through the diagrams while he dug through the painfully small print. The first figure was, if I had a guess, what the vials were for - just a combination of liquids and shavings. The second figure looked like what might have been a finished product - a single jar, with a vague curled form tucked inside - with the steps between probably scattered across several more pages. 

“Do not bother with the rest for now.” 

“Don’t have my glasses, so I wasn’t going to.”  I placed the stack aside. “Box?”

“Box, yes.”  He took my spot at the table, jar set aside and grim irritation plastered on his face, as I crouched.

“It’s just an iron clasp.”

“Presumably only there to keep it out.”  He clicked his fingers, and I watched the metal shred inward in threads of nothing.  “Not anyone competent.”

“Being a giant decomposer doesn’t make you competent.”

“Correct. It is the rest of my person achieves such a status.”

_ Mhm. _  The lid opened without a hitch, and I stood, staring at the contents. 

Anders stared through me. His nose curled in contempt.

Looking at the long-striped bones, with warp-stretched legs and charred eye sockets, brittle with age and cored in spots for samples, I couldn’t really blame him.

 

* * *

 

The cottage burned quickly. We didn’t stay to watch. 

He had stopped eating, but still brought the honey.


	5. Anders

I returned to the mote, jar in hand and Koloti draped around my neck. Today, I was inclined to her vision’s lack of detail. 

The mockery might very well have its use, but not if I was to be forced to look at it. 

As it was, its prospects were minimal, if my suspicion proved correct.

Which it did.

I found it on the floor, writhing, a motion that always held Koloti’s attention. The screaming may have been noteworthy, but the response was one anticipated. 

It clamped its hands across its mouth, trying to muffle the sound, but the convulsions made this difficult.

I extracted a chair from myself, placed it next to where it lay, and sat. 

“What you are currently experiencing-”

I waited for the latest shriek to soften back to a whimper.

“If you do not control yourself, the problem will continue to exacerbate, and you will eventually succumb to shock. I’ve survived it on far more limited resources than this. You’re quite overreacting.”

This did nothing towards making it be quiet.

Resigned that it was going to panic either way - even to the self detriment of itself - I opened the jar, placed it on the ground, and supplemented it with an open thermos of syrup-water and poplar.

“Drink.”

“Th- m-”

“No speaking. It is an inherited condition, bound to a very particular set of internal variables, commonly triggered by stress or panic as a result of faulty adrenal processing. While made of flesh, it was inherited from both of my genetic donors. As, presumably, your  _ only _ genetic donor, so too have you.”

It tried to nod, struggling to both drink and suppress the contortions as the painkiller set in.

“I would appreciate if you understood that, regardless of however long your hypothetical use to me lasts - dependent on why you were created - your end will be met only two ways. By my hand, or by my inheritance. Your existence will be provided so long as you are capable of beneficial behavior.”

Another wave of convulsion wracked it, and it nodded.

 

* * *

 

“It is confirmed to be salt wasting.”

I frowned, setting the phone down as he walked in. He was giving me a look like I should already know what that meant. 

“They’re what?”

“Salt. Wasting.”

“Ok.”   _ I just do horticulture, cunt, you’re the one that eats people. _

He made an irritated gesture at his lower half as he carried on.  “Like a true mockery, it even possesses this.”

_ I mean, yeah.   _ “Thought you made yourself like that. Like, set your middle slider, or whatever.”

“My flesh husk was fashioned this way, tangential pain and all. So, no. Your assumption has long been incorrect.”

“But you tweak your tit size. How was I supposed to not assume you just do that everywhere?”

He shooed the comment off.  “Task at hand. For its nature, its guise is quite limited. It is a higher blend of organic materials than either of us do.”

“So?”

“So, that grants us the boon of a narrow investigation pool. Has the documentation returned anything?”

_ Stopped actually reading at page twenty-something because my eyes glazed over. It’s boring alchemical dribble, like you on a page.  _

“Found a letter draft somewhere. But you might not like it.”

He gestured for me to flip to it, and I did.

_ Might not like it, but sure as hell improves the kid’s chance of survival. _

 

* * *

 

> _ As discussed since the incident with the Dhu'Naahmic, it is clear that we are short on time. Not chronologically, as he seems to be taking his sweet time, but conceptually. _

“I quite was.”

> _ While Adalheidis may be continuing to work towards our shared goal, for her own reasons, those motivations have always been unfounded and may soon come unravelled. We cannot count on her support. _

“If you’d just taken a moment, you know, it would have been  _ abundantly  _ clear that I could never conceivably-”

“We’ve already talked about this.”

“Yes. And I will continue to unto eternity.”

“‘Course you will.”

> _ Our other ventures have proven even less fruitful than the Dhu'Naahmic. I am uncertain if I may ever request this letter’s deliverance because, for all I am aware, the rest of you have already been devoured in the cycle. _

“Were they?”

“Oh, entirely.”

“Good thing he didn’t waste the paper.”

> _ So I will ask for forgiveness here, rather than for permission. Through our contact, by what I am sorry to say were unscrupulous means, I extracted the location of a certain area long-buried. The bones were in the cellar, as he’d said - _

“They left your body in a cellar?”

“I don’t imagine I allowed them time to collect it.”

“That’s not- Why were you  _ in _ the cellar?”

He shrugged.

> _ \- and just as the rest of ours were, the open nature of the rib-cage confirmed that it belonged to one of our overall collective. The rest of the disfiguration simply confirmed the identity. _

“My face is flawless, anointed with skin or otherwise.”

“Think he meant your legs.”

“Also without flaw.”

> _ What I propose retroactively, with these bones, risks on infringing the initial pactwork we all agreed to by accepting Seelabalga.  _
> 
> _ We are all well aware of the Gan Ceann. More conceptual than tangible, birthed by ritual to eliminate a single target then collapse inward. What I propose is a variation of this, due to the failure of our attempts with the base. _

“So they did try?”

“Twice.”

> _ One created by both ritual and flesh. _
> 
> _ Frisiandr is not a being of heavy introspection. _

“Mhm.”

“Mhm.”

> _ Nor, from what Seelabalga reveals about those who walked before us, was Savant. Perhaps even less so. The curse the latter leaked to the former embodies this physically. We know that Frisiandr cannot use his eyes, not because they are not There, but because they are his. _
> 
> _ Anything grown from his may, too, ghost the burden. _

The letter continued from there, but we didn’t.

I could tell he wasn’t pleased. But I could see the gears turning in his head, too.  

“So, basically they’re not just a homunculus.” 

“No. Quite the more a psychopomp.”

“Specially tailored for you.”

“Not necessarily.”


	6. Yemonos

I shrieked as he unravelled into being - eyes, bone, skin, clothes - and dumped a person down to the floor next to me. 

He didn’t wait for introductions.

“My prior intent was to see if you were capable of consuming them.”

_ Eat them? _

“My intent is now, simply, to see if you will kill them.”

I stared at him, then shook my head. 

_ One minute. Carotid artery. _

I didn’t know what a carotid was, and an ‘artery’ was, to the best that I knew, a kind of scaly vegetable. 

“But you are _ aware.” _

I shook my head.

“How many minutes?”

I opened my mouth, then closed it, and held up one finger.

“What of the extraneous parameters? Or, the… Words that are with it. You may speak this, but no more.”

“Cartoid artistry.”

“Are you certain?”

I nodded, hoping just giving him the words would make him leave. When he wasn’t here, it wasn’t really  _ bad. _ I’d collected a lot of moss and grass, and found a sort of corner to make a bed with it. And some wood for shelves, where I put my rocks, and-

Something metallic flicked in his hand, across their throat, and with a gurgling sound a spray of red scattered across the room. I froze; my head felt light, water roared in my ears, and I wanted to wake up. 

Some had gotten on my face, but I couldn’t move to wipe it off.

Some had gotten everywhere.

Too much-

“The carotid artery is the line of blood which traverses through the neck. When severed, the brain is left without oxygen, and the remainder of the husk is swift to expire.”

I closed my eyes.

“I am under the impression that you possess no such function. Your head-”

Eyes still closed, my hands obediently went to work, removing it and offering it. He went silent.

“Return it to its original position.”

I did.

“Clean away the husk. I will return shortly.”

I didn’t open my eyes until I knew he was gone.

_ One million, seven hundred and fifty-two thousand hours- _

 

 


	7. Yemonos

Seasons passed.

Sometimes he would pull me away from the island, out to gatherings. We would walk, and he would have me list the times for people he met, and then I was stashed away again.  

Sometimes, he would bring me to abandoned places - mountains, salt flats, pillars in the ocean. Sometimes there was a child with him, but usually not. Usually it was just me, defending myself, either from him or the awful things he would bring along.

First with the daggers he kept inside his coat, then swords, as I grew into them.

Sometimes, like today, he would make me climb the tower.

He lead in a circular kind of way, never really _moving_ but always _there._ Whenever I clawed my way up the inverted geometry, vertical plantlife, and narrow support beams, he was inexplicably standing two steps ahead.

“- wherein buildings were often constructed not for survival-oriented habitation - they held no need for such - but for storage, or for aesthetic. The Archives, the Aviary -”

I nodded, dragging myself up to the platform, and with a blink he was several more platforms away. Pacing, talking.

Always talking.

I exhaled, tired, and looked down to the floors below.   _Long fall._

_Maybe._

“Hurry along.”

_One million, seven hundred and eight thousand hours-_


	8. Anders

The child of decay finally reached where I stood, atop one of the west wing’s slanted balconies. The limp clung around its legs, as is the inevitable state when cartilage fails to play its part. 

“You may sit.”

It didn’t.   _ Very well. _

“Then we will proceed.”

I tugged back the lapel and fished a hand into the depths of my coat, past the veneer of my glamour, then paused. 

It had approached rather quickly. A thin, bony hand clamped around my wrist - not to pull, just to restrain. I turned my face to regard its heat signature, which was growing cold.

“Pardon-”

The pressure tightened with a thin  _ crack. _

I had been shot before. The sensation now wasn’t dissimilar: a sharp punch through where my heart should have been, the tripping of the memory of a nervous system.

It was tolerable, something that could be rationalized out of, until the cold washed through me. Old pain spiraled up my false legs, into my hips, across organs that weren’t there. Koloti’s eyes were torn away and I was tossed into darkness, suffocating, crushing fathoms. 

_ Dhu'Naahmic.  _

_ Can’t breathe. _

_ Have no need to- Can’t breathe. _

_ Can’t breathe, back again, all again, forever again, hands- _

_ My hands. _

I struggled to find them as my throat closed -  _ No throat, not anymore  _ \- and split, fraying at the seams, unraveling the same as my fingers. They fumbled, twisting, struggling to get a hold on one of the knife handles as they slipped by like fish.

_ No adrenal glands, they decayed with the body. _

_ Panic. _

_ There is no physiological reason to panic. _

_ Dying. _

_ Incapable of dying. _

_ Drowning. _

_ No lungs. _

_ Can’t breathe, hurt, all hurts- _

Metal snicked free of its cover, tore free of the confines of the coat, plunged into muscle. The grip on my other wrist loosened and I snatched for the front of its sweater, shoving it down. Koloti’s eyes blossomed back into place as my knees re-solidified, struck the balcony floor, pinning it. The roar of water left my ears, replaced with useless screams of regret as the knife dug in again, twisted, and again. 

Again.

Again.

_ One mistake too many. _

_ You’ve forfeit.  _


	9. Yemonos

I woke up hazy, my mouth dry, nose full of the smell of iron. Everything ached. 

Hands and tendrils of vines kept me pinned as quiet voices muttered, dream-like, filtered through grog. I clung to them, and tried to keep conscious.

“- find something suitable. I’ve no interest in its consumption.”

“Or you could just-”

“No. There are means of disposal.”

_ One m-llion, --ven hu-dred and eig-- thou--nd h-urs. _

Fingers slid across my neck, spreading little pricks of pain and tightness.

“They won’t remember much after this, right?”

“Correct. Nothing left to chance.”

_ O-e m-ll--n --ve- hu-dred an- -ig-- t-ou--nd h-ur- _

“Then you can just drop them off at Sor’s.”

“Nothing left to chance, Adalheidis.”

“Frisiandr.”

_ O-e m-ll--n --ve- hu-dred an- -ig-- t-ou--nd h-ur- _

“This is not open for discussion.”

“I’m making it open for discussion, you  _ stabbed-” _

“Not nearly enough for it to perish.”

_ O-e --ll--n --ve- hu-d--- an- -ig-- t-ou--n- h---- _

“Its use has been lost to me.”

_ \--- ------- ----- ------- --- ----- -------- ----- _

“It will not benefit any other.”


	10. ???

_ “He’s getting rid of them soon, isn’t he?” _

_ “Just trying to figure out how, yeah. Or maybe he’s waiting for the adrenal shit to take its toll.” _

_ “Not going to just eat them?” _

_ “No. Said he doesn’t want them anywhere near his mouth.” _

_ “That’s good, I guess. You told Sor?” _

_ “A while back. He’s down for it. C’mon.” _

 

* * *

 

Grass and moss tickled my arms. I was tied here -  _ here, somewhere _ \- and left in the dark, to watch the nightbugs. 

_ Sorry. _

They blinked, sparkling gold, as they danced through the shadows of trees beyond the window. 

Footsteps padded close to the door. Two soft, two sharp, two silhouettes. I held my breath, trying to press into the side crevice of the bed as they stepped in. One was tall, with long hair and skin that looked brown in the flickers of light. One was shorter, like a child, and paler, with messy locks.

Both had cloth across their eyes, hands out to feel the wall.

The tall one whispered first, inching closer.  “Yemonos?”

I sucked in my stomach and bit my tongue, struggling against the restraints as quietly as I could. The name sounded familiar. I didn’t like it.

_ Sorry. _

They kept shuffling forward, agonizingly slowly, and I screwed my eyes shut as the smaller one’s hands found my arm.

“Ok! We got here first.”

_ “Don’t scare them.” _

“Pretty sure they’re still asleep, don’t worry. … Huh. They look young, don’t they?”

“Anders said they’ve been aging, just slowly.”

“Like me.”

“Not. Quite like you.”

“I mean, duh. Sheesh. Help me get the belts off.”

She muttered something irritable, he laughed, and I felt the ties start to loosen as their hands set to work. 

_ Wait. _

The minutes dripped past, torturous, drug on by how clumsy they were. I tried to think of why they were wearing the cloth, to stop my heart from pounding, but couldn’t remember. 

_ Almost- _

I felt the last one tugged away. My eyes shot open and I sprung up, shoved past them, and barrelled towards the door. They shouted, and I heard them try to give chase; I didn’t dare look back.

_ Sorry. _

 

* * *

 

I didn’t know where to go, but down the hill through the trees seemed safest. They looked familiar, like I’d dreamt them before, and I hoped that they’d take me off far away. Bugs scattered as I ran through them, struggling to stay steady against the pain eating at my knees.

_ Sorry. _

I knew something had to be close, and got increasingly certain of it as the trees grew sparse. The bugs were gone, but I could see where small glowing stones lit the way. 

_ Almost. _

I leapt across a hill bank, and braced to anticipate the bottom. It didn’t come. My foot struck an anchorless rock, sending it and me both spinning off into open nothingness. The island was above me, then, and growing smaller, a trickle of pebbles tumbling down in my wake.

The ink around me groaned like disgruntled lungs, massive and terrifying, endless roots only lit by the stars above the island. 

_ Sorry. _

I clawed at the air like struggling enough would let me swim, or slow myself, or anything. Tears flooded my eyes and left me behind, but my throat was too tight to cry.

_ Sorry. _

The island was almost out of sight now, overshadowed by its bottom half.

My wrist caught, and my shoulder screamed as it was torn out of socket. Cruel fingers yanked me up like a ragdoll, nails digging into my skin, and the cry broke out of me in ragged gasps. 

_ “I’m sorry.” _

Blank eyes framed in burns looked back at me. Not disappointed. Not pleased. 

He was on a smaller island, a cluster, and I tried to claw for him with my free hand.   _ “Please I’m-” _

With a sigh, he tossed me back.


	11. Remus

I woke up on the floor.

I was slick with a cold sweat, clinging to the pillow I had brought down with me.

I couldn’t move; I struggled to process the knock at the front door as being what it was.

“Oi! Rem!”

_ Not him. _

“Rem! You up yet?”

_ Not him. _

I struggled to my feet, bracing myself on the nightstand as I bit back the pain from standing. I pulled a blanket off of the bed and wrapped it like a shawl, hugging myself to stop the shaking.

_ Not him. _

Parting the curtain found snow up to the bottom of the frame, and looking around found Marian stamping her boots on the mat. She caught sight of me and waved, face splitting into a grin. I managed a weak smile and waved back. 

“It’s freezing!”

_ Not him. _

I signed back an unsteady ‘Coming!’

“Get some pants!”

I wheezed and dropped the curtain back, burying my face in the blanket as she laughed.

My hands found their way behind the curtain, where I signed a quick  _  ‘Behave!’ _  before pulling them back. I snatched up slacks and an undershirt from the dresser, plucked off a thread that had started to unwind from my boxers, and limped to the bathroom.

The top was easier to tug on - just a pull-over - but the pants were always more painful. Shifting weight or bending was always an ordeal.

The cold didn’t help.

I smoothed myself out once I was settled again, hands pausing across my chest, before I unwound my scarf from the hook on the back of the door. 

I ran a thumb over the old frays, then across the side of the seam on my neck.

I tugged the cloth over it, a bit tighter than it needed to be.

_ Not him. _

“Hurry up old man! Know you’ll want tea, and we’ve got two orders to crank out!”

I snorted, rubbing my face to try and smudge out the tears.

_ Never him. _

I grabbed my coat and hat, then started for the door.

_ Just me. _


End file.
